


afterimage

by deepnest



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Canon, Tenderness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:40:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24886231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepnest/pseuds/deepnest
Summary: Strange to complain of a bad night, after everything that came before.
Relationships: Hornet/Lace (Hollow Knight)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 70





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**Author's Note:**

> one day I'll delve into Lace's issues... I do have some thoughts for what they might be.
> 
> but for now, I am still consumed by concern for a certain spider demigod.
> 
> tw: gore, for food prep reasons

Lace took a certain amount of pleasure from shelling meat. The crack of it, the soft pop under her fingertips just before the give. Start in the center of the back, break it, and then draw her hands forward to split up to the head. 

Tip the blood into the bowl, and pry it open the rest of the way to pluck out the organs. The snap of connective tissue, practically musical itself. 

She sang, "Dear little bug, don't be upset, you'll be such a fine supper yet..." 

Hornet did not answer. No dry remarks about how the notion of being supper cheered few creatures. No rhymed reply; although Hornet was less given to proper singing, she might try sometimes. 

Not even a laugh. Lace's comic compositions, especially improvised, were not her strong suit, but Hornet never failed to appreciate them.

There was only the steady chop of the knife against the cutting board. Lace turned. 

Hornet stood at the opposite counter. A pile of root slices loomed on one side of the board, already plenty for what they were making, but Hornet stayed her hand just long enough to grab another. 

Lace saw the slight shift of Hornet's shoulders under her cloak as she started slicing again. Saw her complete stillness otherwise, her head bent. Lace could not see, from where she stood, Hornet's eyes, the focus in them absolute on the blade in her hand.

Sometimes all Hornet could bear was cold metal. Sometimes she needed something different.

Lace finished with the organs, but she was paying careful attention to the rhythm of the knife now. She heard the next pause and asked, "Hornet, how are the vegetables coming?"

"What? Ah. Excessively. I'm sorry." 

The knife's handle clacked on the cutting board as Hornet set it down. Lace spun again, and crossed to her side.

"For what will make a richer flavor? No, it's quite alright." 

Lace did not take Hornet's hand, or touch her, because Hornet was already moving, tying the netted sack of vegetables shut and tucking it away.

"I'm not worried about the vegetables. I'm worried about you," Lace said easily. "Go lie down, darling. I'll join you in a moment."

Hornet spoke into the cabinet, as she fussed with the packages arranged there. "We must finish supper."

"I think I can handle putting some stew on, don't you?" 

Lace set a hand on Hornet's shoulder as she straightened. Hornet went still once again, did not move to dislodge Lace. She'd quieted even her breathing, as if her lungs might betray something in her, a secret, a desire, or something that was both. 

Lace insisted, "Go on. Lie down. I won't be going anywhere but to your side, I promise."

Hornet let out a slow breath. "Very well."

She had nothing else to offer. She whirled, cloak flaring and settling back around her, and left the kitchen. 

Lace dealt swiftly with the few remaining vegetables, dumped them all in the pot with the blood and the organs cubed, coated in flour, and seared; and put it on to cook with more water than she estimated needing. She'd be away for a moment.

Then she followed Hornet to the bedroom. The lights were covered, the curtains drawn, and so the dim winter afternoon left them in darkness.

Hornet was in the center of the bed. She shifted to one side, though, hearing the door open. A new reflex.

She said, "Thank you for finishing supper."

"Mhm," Lace acknowledged. "It's a bad night, isn't it?"

Hornet laughed, cutting, humorless. "Funny to call it that."

"But it must be. You hardly protested when I told you to lie down."

"It was a reasonable suggestion. I was feeling unwell."

"Care to talk about it?"

"No."

"Would you like me to hold you, then?"

"You need not." And then, as Lace drew breath to speak, Hornet finished: "But you asked me what I liked, not what you needed."

"Well?"

Hornet pressed a hand over the eye not buried in the pillow. "Lie down with me?"

Lace climbed onto the bed and settled onto her side, facing Hornet without yet touching her. 

All Hornet said was, "It is difficult sometimes."

"Oh, yes." 

Lace waited, but it seemed that that was all Hornet cared to articulate, or all that she could. And then they lay together in silence. Hornet closed her eyes, and Lace would have thought Hornet was sleeping, were it not for the regular depth of her breathing. 

Hornet was still again. She might be for some time yet, possessing as she did a dangerous capacity for patience. She'd honed it as sharp as her needle, but it had an edge that faded more slowly and could cut inward just as well. 

She spoke sooner than Lace had expected. "It feels wrong. Somehow." Her eyes snapped open. "Physically, you see. I am talking about things not touching where they should. Where I am, I am not… It sounds foolish, doesn't it?"

"Not to me," Lace said.

"Truly?" Hornet set a hand between them. 

"Truly." Lace took it in her own. She ran her thumb over Hornet's knuckles. "Can you feel that?" 

"Yes." Another breath, intentional, like half of a breathing exercise. "I feel you."

"Yes, just so…" Lace pulled Hornet's hand closer and curled in on herself, enough to bring Hornet's knuckles to her mouth and kiss them. "And this, ma petite araignée?"

Hornet nodded. 

Lace unfurled Hornet's closed hand, and kissed the tips of her claws, one by one. "And this… What does this tell you?"

"You're here." 

"Yes. You're here, and so am I. This is our home."

Hornet spoke under her breath, as if to herself, "What we've made, carved out, here… Lace?"

"Yes, Hornet?" 

A tremor in Hornet's voice, the kind Lace had never heard from her when she'd had a blade at her throat, when she was bleeding or near-broken. But it was there now, in the dark, in safety. "Now you may hold me." 

Lace eased forward, and slipped an arm under Hornet's side so her hands could meet behind Hornet's back. Hornet hunched inward, her head tipped back so she could fit against Lace. Lace freed a hand to stroke down one horn.

Hornet tensed, but only nestled closer to Lace as she did so. She was shaking, just slightly; she could have held it in - no doubt she had been holding it in, and willfully made herself stop. She didn't seem quite able to cry, some part of her lodged away too tightly to allow it tonight. 

Lace held Hornet, anyway. Held her and kissed her and through this - although Hornet kept her arms tucked between them, her palms pressed to Lace's chest - Lace had given her something to hold onto in turn. Something she could feel without doubting its nature.


End file.
